Apple today unveiled Apple Home Collection, a lineup of nine smart home accessories built with LG Electronics and Schneider Electric, comprising four cameras, a smart lock, two thermostats and two room sensors, priced from $39.95 to $399.95 and sold through Apple's own stores from December in the US, Canada and the UK.

In Short

Apple worked with LG and Schneider Electric to make cameras, a door lock, thermostats and sensors that are set up with one tap on an iPhone and run entirely inside Apple's Home app. It matters because Apple is now choosing and selling a recommended set of home devices itself, with camera video kept in iCloud+ under encryption that Apple says neither it nor the two partners can read. Nothing in the lineup is listed for sale in the European Union, and the products reach buyers from December, with some arriving only in early 2027.

What Apple is selling

The announcement, dated October 13, 2026 and issued from Cupertino, describes Apple Home Collection as "a new lineup of smart home accessories" designed in collaboration with the two manufacturers. Apple has long allowed third-party devices into its home platform through the Works with Apple Home and Matter certification programmes. This lineup is different in one respect: Apple co-designed the products, recommends them by name and will stock them at apple.com/store, in the Apple Store app and in Apple Store locations.

According to Apple, the prices in US dollars are as follows:

  • LG Video Doorbell Wired - from $249.95
  • LG Floodlight Cam - from $399.95
  • LG Outdoor Cam Plug-In - from $299.95
  • LG Indoor Cam Plug-In - from $199.95
  • LG Smart Deadbolt Lock - from $349.95
  • LG Smart Thermostat - from $199.95
  • LG Temperature Sensor - from $39.95
  • Schneider Home Smart Thermostat - from $199.95
  • Schneider Home Room Sensor - from $39.95

Installation parts are sold separately. The LG C-Wire Power Adapter and the Schneider Home C-Wire Power Adapter both start at $24.95, and a Schneider Home Trim Plate starts at $14.95.

Geography varies by device. The three LG outdoor and doorway cameras come in Essence Graphite and Essence Silver in the US, Canada and the UK, and the Indoor Cam is offered in Essence White in the same three countries. The lock, both thermostats and both sensors are listed only for the US and Canada. Availability begins in December, "with select accessories available starting early 2027," according to Apple, though the release does not say which products fall into the later window.

Matthew Costello, Apple's vice president of Hardware Engineering, said: "Apple Home Collection makes it easy to choose smart home accessories with confidence. Working closely with industry leaders LG Electronics and Schneider Electric, we designed every accessory to work seamlessly with Apple Home, so managing your home is simple, reliable, and private."

No separate app, no separate account

The organising idea is that the manufacturer's own software disappears. Each accessory is added by tapping it with an iPhone, in a process Apple compares to setting up a HomePod, "with no additional app to download and no separate account to create." A footnote adds that this NFC pairing requires an iPhone running the latest operating system, and that other features require a home hub such as Apple HomeView, HomePod or Apple TV.

Several connectivity details sit behind that promise. Every device supports Thread, the low-power mesh protocol, which Apple says helps maintain connectivity if Wi-Fi drops. The products also update their network credentials automatically when a household changes its Wi-Fi network - a task that on many smart home devices requires re-pairing each one by hand.

For LG, the arrangement is a notable concession. A hardware maker that ships a camera without its own app gives up the direct relationship with the buyer that an app usually provides: account sign-ups, usage data and a channel for upselling services. Kihyun Jung, LG Electronics' executive vice president, framed it differently: "LG Electronics has spent decades developing technologies and products designed around the way people live. Working closely with Apple, we've co-created a more connected, intuitive, and convenient home experience for our customers."

Four cameras and the iCloud+ model

All four LG cameras capture video at up to 2.5K resolution and recognise people, familiar faces, pets, vehicles and packages. Recognising familiar faces is a form of facial recognition, a category that regulators and courts have treated with care. Apple's own handling of faceprints in iPhone Photos is the subject of a federal class action in Illinois, where a judge on September 30, 2026 mostly denied Apple's bid to end the case. The court in that case held that end-to-end encryption does not by itself mean Apple lacks control over data it syncs.

The individual devices

The Video Doorbell carries two cameras. A front camera records 2.5K video of visitors while a bottom camera, at full HD resolution, watches packages left on the ground. It includes a built-in spotlight and plays its chime through HomeView, HomePod and HomePod mini rather than a separate chime box.

The Floodlight Cam pairs adaptive dual floodlights, which switch on when motion is detected, with low-light colour night vision. The Outdoor Cam offers the same night vision in an angled, self-installed housing.

The Indoor Cam is the most unusual of the four. According to Apple, it tilts up to view the room when a user checks in on the home and "tilting back down to stop monitoring as soon as the first member of the household returns." Users can also tilt it manually or from the Home app. A physically averted lens is a more visible privacy signal than a software toggle, and it is the kind of detail that matters to anyone uneasy about a camera in a living room.

Storage and Apple Intelligence

There is no separate camera subscription. Video history is stored in the user's iCloud+ plan, which provides 10 days of event recordings. The footnotes set out the tiers: the 50GB plan supports one camera, the 200GB plan up to five, and the 2TB plan an unlimited number. Apple notes that "supported camera counts and other iCloud+ plan features may change over time."

On eligible plans, Apple Intelligence adds automatic text descriptions of what happens in each clip and lets users search footage in natural language. Those features need an Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhone or iPad for setup, and some, including video summaries, "are available for a limited number of cameras depending on the user's iCloud+ plan," according to Apple. The release does not give those limits.

Built-in storage keeps the cameras recording during Wi-Fi outages. Live video and quick snapshots are viewable on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV 4K and HomeView.

The model is worth pausing on. Competing camera makers typically charge a separate monthly fee for cloud history; Apple instead folds the cost into a subscription it already sells for photo and file storage. That ties the camera's ongoing value to Apple's services business, which grew 12% to $30.739 billion in the June quarter of 2026, carrying a 75.6% gross margin against 40.1% for products. Every household that needs to record five cameras rather than one has a reason to move from the 50GB tier to the 200GB tier.

The lock and the front door

The LG Smart Deadbolt Lock uses Ultra Wideband radio to judge how far away a user is and whether they are approaching. When someone carrying a home key on a compatible iPhone or Apple Watch walks up, the door unlocks without a tap. Alternatives include tapping the phone or watch, an integrated PIN pad and a hidden backup key slot. Sensors detect whether the door is open, closed or being tampered with, and the lock alerts users if the door is open even while the bolt is thrown.

Guest access - Apple's examples are a dog walker, house sitter or visiting relative - is shared through the Home app. The lock is Matter compatible and supports Aliro, the access credential standard, and Apple says it works entirely locally, so core functions continue without an internet connection.

Paired with the doorbell, the lock forms what Apple calls a front-door system. When a visitor rings, a chime plays on HomeView, HomePod or HomePod mini, a notification lands on the user's devices, and the user can see the visitor, speak to them and unlock the door from a single view or by asking Siri.

Thermostats and Clean Energy Guidance

Two thermostats are on offer, one from each partner, so that buyers can match the product to their wider energy setup. Both work with the Home app's Adaptive Temperature feature, which uses on-device intelligence from the iPhone to adjust heating and cooling depending on whether someone is at home, winding down at night or away, without manual schedules.

In the contiguous US, Clean Energy Guidance can move heating and cooling to cleaner, cheaper periods for users on compatible utility plans, and the Home app shows usage over time including peak and off-peak rates. Multi-room readings come from the new LG and Schneider sensors or from sensors already built into HomeView, HomePod and HomePod mini. Both thermostats and the sensors are Matter compatible, designed for self-installation, and include on-device wire detection to simplify wiring.

Olivier Blum, Schneider Electric's chief executive, said: "As a global leader in energy technology, we are proud to bring our experience in innovative and advanced climate control to Apple Home. Schneider Home's new Smart Thermostat is a true collaboration with Apple to give customers a seamless way to help manage their home's energy use, effortlessly blending efficiency with everyday comfort and simplicity."

Automation across devices

Apple describes scenes that span the lineup. A single "Good Morning" scene can adjust the thermostat, tilt the indoor camera down and start music on a HomePod. Using on-device intelligence from an iPhone or Apple Watch, the system can recognise routines: when the last person leaves, the thermostat sets back, the door locks and the cameras resume monitoring; before they return, heating or cooling begins and the front door unlocks on approach.

For customers who would rather not drill holes themselves, Apple Retail now offers third-party installation from ADT for an additional charge, available in the US "starting this fall," according to Apple. The price is not disclosed.

The privacy claim

Apple states that camera footage and Home app data are "stored end-to-end encrypted and never accessible to LG Electronics, Schneider Electric, or Apple." Footage is processed locally on the home hub or in Private Cloud Compute, Apple's server-side AI environment, and kept encrypted in iCloud for 10 days for iCloud+ users. "No one, not even Apple, can access the data," the release says.

That claim carries commercial weight. A doorbell sees who visits a home and when; a thermostat knows when a household is empty; a lock records every entry. Such signals are exactly the kind of behavioural data that could, in another company's hands, inform audience segments or attribution models. By placing the partners outside the encryption boundary, Apple removes LG and Schneider from that data flow entirely.

The approach contrasts with how other platforms have moved. Amazon's Ring said in August 2026 that its TAKE encryption scheme would become the default for customer video from September, though a temporary copy of each video still sits in a cloud enclave that Ring can access to run features such as Smart Alerts, and full end-to-end encryption on Ring remains optional and disables some features. Google began adding Gemini models to Nest cameras in 2024, offering natural-language descriptions and search of camera activity to Nest Aware subscribers - functionally close to what Apple now offers through iCloud+.

The release does not say how Apple responds to law enforcement requests for home data, how long locally stored footage on the cameras' built-in storage is retained, or how the guest access logs are kept. Those are the questions that typically follow a privacy claim of this kind.

Europe is missing

The geographic list is as revealing as the product list. No accessory is listed for any EU country. And a closing note in the release reads: "Apple HomeView is not available for sale in the European Union, as Siri AI is currently unavailable in iOS in the EU. Apple is working constructively with the EU in an attempt to find a path forward."

That extends a pattern PPC Land has tracked through 2026. At WWDC in June, Apple said Siri AI would not ship on iPhone or iPad in the EU at launch, citing the Digital Markets Act. When the software arrived on September 14, Siri AI reached EU Macs and Apple Vision Pro but not EU iPhones, iPads or Apple Watches. The $1,999 iPhone Duo, shown on September 9, also came without Siri AI for European buyers. HomeView now joins that list as the first Apple hardware product withheld from sale altogether.

EU households face a separate regulatory backdrop for exactly these devices. Under the EU Data Act, makers of connected products such as smart thermostats had until September 12, 2026 to design them so users can directly access the data they generate, and share it with third parties. A product line built on the principle that neither manufacturer nor platform can read the data would sit awkwardly alongside rules written on the assumption that someone holds it. Whether that played any part in the EU absence is not addressed in the release; Apple's stated reason concerns Siri AI and HomeView only.

Why it matters for marketers

For the advertising industry, the significance is less about thermostats than about who controls the home as a data environment. Amazon has positioned Alexa as a household interface; Alexa+ was offered free to Prime members and at $19.99 a month to others. Google has built Gemini into Nest. Apple's answer is a curated set of devices sold in its own retail channel, with no third-party app in the loop and data that, by Apple's account, no company can read.

That has two consequences. First, signals from these devices will not be available for targeting or measurement by LG, Schneider or Apple's own advertising business, at least on Apple's description of the encryption. Second, the manufacturers trade a customer relationship for shelf space in Apple Stores, a shift that changes who owns the buyer of a $349.95 lock. With two of the world's larger appliance and energy companies accepting those terms, the question for other device makers is whether they will be asked to do the same.

Timeline

Summary

Who: Apple, with LG Electronics and Schneider Electric. Quoted executives are Matthew Costello, Apple's vice president of Hardware Engineering; Kihyun Jung, executive vice president of LG Electronics; and Olivier Blum, chief executive of Schneider Electric. ADT provides optional installation through Apple Retail.

What: Apple Home Collection, nine co-designed smart home accessories - four LG cameras, an LG smart lock, LG and Schneider thermostats and two room sensors - priced from $39.95 to $399.95, set up with one iPhone tap and run entirely through Apple's Home app, with camera video kept end-to-end encrypted in iCloud+ for 10 days.

When: Announced today, October 13, 2026. Availability begins in December 2026, with select accessories in early 2027; ADT installation starts in the US this fall.

Where: Sold through apple.com/store, the Apple Store app and Apple Store locations. Cameras are listed for the US, Canada and the UK; the lock, thermostats and sensors for the US and Canada; Clean Energy Guidance covers the contiguous US. No accessory is listed for the EU, and HomeView is not offered for sale there.

Why: Apple is moving from certifying third-party home devices to co-designing and selling a recommended set, removing manufacturers' apps and accounts and keeping household data out of reach of both partners and Apple. For marketers, it narrows access to home behavioural signals and shifts the customer relationship for these devices from the manufacturer to Apple.